SRD:Movement
Movement There are three movement scales, as follows. *Tactical, for combat, measured in feet (or squares) per round. *Local, for exploring an area, measured in feet per minute. *Overland, for getting from place to place, measured in miles per hour or miles per day. Modes of Movement While moving at the different movement scales, creatures generally walk, hustle, or run. =Walk = A walk represents unhurried but purposeful movement at 3 miles per hour for an unencumbered human. =Hustle = A hustle is a jog at about 6 miles per hour for an unencumbered human. A character moving his or her speed twice in a single round, or moving that speed in the same round that he or she performs a standard action or another move action is hustling when he or she moves. =Run (×3) = Moving three times speed is a running pace for a character in heavy armor. It represents about 9 miles per hour for a human in full plate. =Run (×4) = Moving four times speed is a running pace for a character in light, medium, or no armor. It represents about 12 miles per hour for an unencumbered human, or 8 miles per hour for a human in chainmail. Tactical Movement :see also: Movement, Position, and Distance Use tactical movement for combat. Characters generally don’t walk during combat—they hustle or run. A character who moves his or her speed and takes some action is hustling for about half the round and doing something else the other half. Hampered Movement Difficult terrain, obstacles, or poor visibility can hamper movement. When movement is hampered, each square moved into usually counts as two squares, effectively reducing the distance that a character can cover in a move. If more than one condition applies, multiply together all additional costs that apply. (This is a specific exception to the normal rule for doubling) In some situations, your movement may be so hampered that you don’t have sufficient speed even to move 5 feet (1 square). In such a case, you may use a full-round action to move 5 feet (1 square) in any direction, even diagonally. Even though this looks like a 5-foot step, it’s not, and thus it provokes attacks of opportunity normally. (You can’t take advantage of this rule to move through impassable terrain or to move when all movement is prohibited to you.) You can’t run or charge through any square that would hamper your movement. Local Movement Characters exploring an area use local movement, measured in feet per minute. Walk A character can walk without a problem on the local scale. Hustle A character can hustle without a problem on the local scale. See Overland Movement, below, for movement measured in miles per hour. Run A character with a Constitution score of 9 or higher can run for a minute without a problem. Generally, a character can run for a minute or two before having to rest for a minute Overland Movement Characters covering long distances cross-country use overland movement. Overland movement is measured in miles per hour or miles per day. A day represents 8 hours of actual travel time. For rowed watercraft, a day represents 10 hours of rowing. For a sailing ship, it represents 24 hours. Walk A character can walk 8 hours in a day of travel without a problem. Walking for longer than that can wear him or her out (see Forced March, below). Hustle A character can hustle for 1 hour without a problem. Hustling for a second hour in between sleep cycles deals 1 point of nonlethal damage, and each additional hour deals twice the damage taken during the previous hour of hustling. A character who takes any nonlethal damage from hustling becomes fatigued. A fatigued character can’t run or charge and takes a penalty of –2 to Strength and Dexterity. Eliminating the nonlethal damage also eliminates the fatigue. Run A character can’t run for an extended period of time. Attempts to run and rest in cycles effectively work out to a hustle. Terrain The terrain through which a character travels affects how much distance he or she can cover in an hour or a day (see Table: Terrain and Overland Movement). A highway is a straight, major, paved road. A road is typically a dirt track. A trail is like a road, except that it allows only single-file travel and does not benefit a party traveling with vehicles. Trackless terrain is a wild area with no paths. Forced March In a day of normal walking, a character walks for 8 hours. The rest of the daylight time is spent making and breaking camp, resting, and eating. A character can walk for more than 8 hours in a day by making a forced march. For each hour of marching beyond 8 hours, a Constitution check (DC 10, +2 per extra hour) is required. If the check fails, the character takes 1d6 points of nonlethal damage. A character who takes any nonlethal damage from a forced march becomes fatigued. Eliminating the nonlethal damage also eliminates the fatigue. It’s possible for a character to march into unconsciousness by pushing himself too hard. Mounted Movement A mount bearing a rider can move at a hustle. The damage it takes when doing so, however, is lethal damage, not nonlethal damage. The creature can also be ridden in a forced march, but its Constitution checks automatically fail, and, again, the damage it takes is lethal damage. Mounts also become fatigued when they take any damage from hustling or forced marches. See Table: Mounts and Vehicles for mounted speeds and speeds for vehicles pulled by draft animals. Waterborne Movement See Table: Mounts and Vehicles for speeds for water vehicles. Evasion and Pursuit In round-by-round movement, simply counting off squares, it’s impossible for a slow character to get away from a determined fast character without mitigating circumstances. Likewise, it’s no problem for a fast character to get away from a slower one. When the speeds of the two concerned characters are equal, there’s a simple way to resolve a chase: If one creature is pursuing another, both are moving at the same speed, and the chase continues for at least a few rounds, have them make opposed Dexterity checks to see who is the faster over those rounds. If the creature being chased wins, it escapes. If the pursuer wins, it catches the fleeing creature. Sometimes a chase occurs overland and could last all day, with the two sides only occasionally getting glimpses of each other at a distance. In the case of a long chase, an opposed Constitution check made by all parties determines which can keep pace the longest. If the creature being chased rolls the highest, it gets away. If not, the chaser runs down its prey, outlasting it with stamina. Moving Around in Squares In general, when the characters aren’t engaged in round-by-round combat, they should be able to move anywhere and in any manner that you can imagine real people could. A 5-foot square, for instance, can hold several characters; they just can’t all fight effectively in that small space. The rules for movement are important for combat, but outside combat they can impose unnecessary hindrances on character activities. See also *Flying rules